In this article, we will take a look at the 10 most promising AI stocks according to analysts.
The General Outlook for Tech and AI is Positive
While 2024 has been a solid year for defensive stocks and utilities, the technology sector, on the other hand, experienced significant headwinds. However, the general outlook for technology and AI is starting to improve as we near the end of 2024. On October 9, Dominic Rizzo, T. Rowe Price portfolio manager, appeared in an interview on Yahoo Finance to discuss his thesis for the AI industry.
Most investors were disappointed after they failed to generate higher returns for their investments in AI during the second quarter of 2024. While Rizzo expects the theme to prevail for the next few quarters, he suggests that the technology and AI sector is on track to earn better returns, especially companies using artificial intelligence to improve their businesses.
As for the Magnificent Seven, while all companies have distinct business models and offerings, these companies have grown at a 50% to 100% faster rate than the rest of the market, making it reasonable to group them. Overall, Rizzo reiterates that while the group has been under immense pressure, it is well-positioned to leverage AI to its benefit.
Rizzo believes that AI is an innovation that is here to stay rather than a mere disruptive technology, meaning that companies using it to their benefit will most likely perform better than the ones that are not. Therefore, most if not companies have no other option but to direct investments in AI chips and GPUs. He expects the AI chip market to reach $400 billion by 2027.
Jamie Dimon is Not Worried about AI Taking Over Jobs
Technology has been altering the world since humans came into being. On October 8, Jamie Dimon, JPMorgan CEO appeared in an interview on Bloomberg Television where he discussed the role of artificial intelligence, initial public offerings, and the easing cycle by the Fed.
According to Dimon, technology was previously limited to certain regions and countries, but now we have tech centers in almost every part of the world including Berlin, Glasgow, and Edinburgh. According to Dimon, the acceleration in technology is great and he is glad that innovation is taking precedence, especially in Europe.
Speaking of AI, Dimon suggests that artificial intelligence is going to change a lot of things that are common elements of our world. As far as job losses go, technology has always been changing the job market and is mostly responsible for taking away jobs. However, he emphasizes the need to look at the bigger picture.
Overall, Dimon suggests that jobs will likely be more enhanced and researched-oriented. As for sectors like finance, people have been using it to detect fraud and minimize risk already. Similarly, AI has limited a lot of marketing jobs but at the same time, it has left a positive impact on productivity. Dimon shares he is not worried about AI changing the job landscape and that we should focus on re-training and re-educating workers losing their jobs as new technologies keep springing.
Now that we have studied the outlook of the AI industry, let’s take a look at the most promising AI stocks to buy according to analysts.
A scientist at a computer station, surrounded by a neural network of artificial intelligence code.
Our Methodology
To come up with the most promising AI stocks according to analysts, we sifted through multiple ETFs, our own rankings, and similar rankings on the internet. We then ranked the most promising AI stocks based on the Analyst upside as of October 9, 2024. We also included the hedge fund sentiment for each stock. It is to be noted, that we only considered stocks with a market capitalization of over $1 billion, as of October 9, 2024.
Why are we interested in the stocks that hedge funds pile into? The reason is simple: our research has shown that we can outperform the market by imitating the top stock picks of the best hedge funds. Our quarterly newsletter’s strategy selects 14 small-cap and large-cap stocks every quarter and has returned 275% since May 2014, beating its benchmark by 150 percentage points (see more details here).
10 Most Promising AI Stocks According to Analysts
10. Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT)
Analyst Upside as of October 9, 2024: 21%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 279
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is one of the biggest technology companies in the world that develops productivity and business suite applications, cloud products, and personal computing products.
Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) reported revenue worth $64.7 billion in FQ4 2024, up by 15% year-over-year. During the same quarter, Microsoft Cloud had $36.8 billion in quarterly revenue, up by 21% year-over-year, and posted record bookings. The company is a leading investor in artificial intelligence technology. Its AI-backed cloud service, Azure OpenAI service witnessed an increase in customer base by 60%, reaching 60,000 clients in the second quarter of 2024.
Previously in July, Microsoft and Lumen Technologies signed a partnership to enhance and modernize Lumen’s workloads to Microsoft Azure. Earlier in August, Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) partnered with Palantir Technologies, a data software company, to deploy Palantir’s suite of products in Microsoft Azure. In the past few weeks, the company initiated investments in other countries, signed new partnerships, and nurtured existing strategic partnerships. On October 8, Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) announced that Microsoft Azure is the first cloud to be running on NVIDIA’s Blackwell system backed by AI systems, further strengthening its position in AI.
Overall, Microsoft Corporation’s (NASDAQ:MSFT) outlook toward AI coupled with its strong cloud ecosystem makes it one of the most promising AI stocks according to analysts. In the second quarter, 279 hedge funds held positions in Microsoft (NASDAQ:MSFT) and their stakes amounted to $89.068 billion.
Baron Opportunity Fund stated the following regarding Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Microsoft Corporation (NASDAQ:MSFT) is the world’s largest software and cloud computing company. Microsoft was traditionally known for its Windows and Office products, but over the last five years it has built a $135 billion run-rate cloud business, including its Azure cloud infrastructure service and its Office 365 and Dynamics 365 cloud-delivered applications. The stock contributed to performance because of continued strong operating results and investor enthusiasm regarding Microsoft’s leadership across the secular megatrends of AI and cloud computing. Recent business momentum continued to show evidence of the strength and attractiveness of Microsoft’s product portfolio among its customer set: (1) Azure OpenAI – its suite of AI services – is now used by 65% of the Fortune 100 and contributed 7% of Azure revenue (an annualized run rate of $5.2 billion); (2) GitHub Copilot – its AI code writing service – is bending the productivity curve for developers (reports of 40%- plus improvements in developer efficiency) and now has 1.8 million paid subscribers, with growth accelerating to over 35% quarter-over-quarter; and (3) Copilot Studio – its AI application service that makes it easier for anyone to build an application, automate a workflow, or create a Copilot using natural language. 30,000 organizations across every industry have used Copilot Studio to customize Copilot for Microsoft 365 or build their own, up 175% quarter-over-quarter. In the March quarter, Microsoft again reported better-than-expected financial results, highlighted by Microsoft Cloud growing 23% year-over-year, with the fastest commercial bookings in six quarters, and Azure accelerating to 31% constant currency growth, up from 28% in the previous quarter. June quarter guidance came in-line with consensus, but the company provided higher guidance for the most important segment, Intelligent Cloud, on the back of continued strong trends across Azure and Azure OpenAI. We remain confident that Microsoft is one of the best-positioned companies across the overlapping software, cloud computing, and AI landscapes.”
9. Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN)
Analyst Upside as of October 9, 2024: 22%
Number of Hedge Fund Holders: 308
Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) ranks ninth on our list of the most promising AI stocks according to analysts. Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) is a technology company that specializes in e-commerce, online retail, streaming, and data cloud services.
Its proprietary cloud service, Amazon Web Services (AWS), increased its revenue by 18.8% in Q2 and has reported 30% plus operating margins consistently for the past five quarters. Coming to its dominance in AI, Over the past few months, the company has not only forged partnerships with AI startups and the government but it has also been actively involved in the development of AI hardware. Recent chips produced by the company include Trainium and Inferentia.
In addition to that, AWS is now housing the next generation of Llama models from Meta, giving customers more choices to build, deploy, and scale generative AI applications. On September 19, Amazon.com Inc (NASDAQ:AMZN) launched Project Amelia, a selling assistant backed by generative AI, allowing sellers to offer better customer assistance and reach.
Overall, AWS has close to 31% market share in cloud computing, indicative of its dominance in the market. Now that AWS is increasingly adopting AI-backed systems, the company is poised to become a fully AI-run company in the next few years.
Analysts are bullish on AMZN and their 12-month median price target of $220 points to a 22% upside from current levels. According to our Insider Monkey database, AMZN was held by 308 hedge funds at the close of Q2 2024 with total stakes amounting to $65.85 billion.
Diamond Hill SelectStrategy stated the following regarding Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN) in its Q2 2024 investor letter:
“Among our top individual contributors in Q2 were Amazon.com, Inc. (NASDAQ:AMZN), Texas Instruments and Mr. Cooper Group. Internet retail and cloud infrastructure company Amazon is benefiting from strong profitability, particularly in its Amazon Web Services (AWS) business. Shares also received a boost amid growing optimism around the demand for AWS as Amazon customers’ investments in generative AI projects continue growing.”